Towards responding to climate change: practices in Iranian healthcare centers

Abstract The aim of this study was to investigate the prevailing practices suitable for Iranian healthcare centers to address climate change and to rank them in terms of priority. This paper, a mixed-methods study conducted in 2023, comprised a scoping review and a thematic analysis covering the period from 2000 to 2023 as the first phase of the study. In this regard, PubMed, Scopus, ProQuest, and the Cochrane Database of Systematic Reviews were searched. In the second phase, the authors engaged a group of experts to prioritize the most important practices suitable for Iranian healthcare centers to address climate change using the Grey MEREC-MABAC integrated approach. The scoping review resulted in 38 studies, and the thematic analysis revealed 11 primary categories of practices employed to address climate change. Subsequently, the Grey MEREC-MABAC approach indicated that the themes of 'Green Environment' (CC = 0.0929), 'Green Equipment, Waste, and Water Management' (CC = 0.0677), and 'Green Energy' (CC = 0.0653) were identified as having the highest priority among the practices deemed most important in the literature for addressing climate change within Iranian healthcare centers. The study proposed that practices or activities promoting biodiversity and environmental sustainability, such as organic food farming and tree planting, should be considered paramount approaches in Iranian healthcare centers to combat climate change.